The design process of a reading comprehension manual

Abstract

Material design is an important part in the teaching practices. This article describes the process of material design of a foreign language (FL) reading manual for undergraduate students at Universidad de Antioquia (Medellín – Colombia). A case study was used as a research method. Four in-service English teachers based their inquiry following the reflective approach of professional development. They also took into account the guidelines to design teaching materials proposed by Howard and Major (2004). Some of the results of their inquiry for the design of the manual involve contextualization, personalization, and students’ needs. A sample of a reading strategy is given in order to illustrate how teachers worked and designed the manual as a product of their inquiry. Conclusions suggest that this professional development practice helped teachers become more aware of their own teaching realities and also helped them to understand their beliefs and practice in teaching reading as a foreign language.

Keywords

• FL reading, material design, professional development